Somebody Who Cares
by Unmasked Potential
Summary: To grieve is to be a being in this world. We all will lose someone one day, and then, ourselves too. This was written about the grieving process while also finding hope and meaning in what to do with our lives as we exist without our loved ones. This story grapples with the concepts of life and death, of meaning in the meaninglessness by using inspired song lyrics. Set after AIW.


Somebody Who Cares

* * *

It was a gray afternoon with rain sprinkling down the many glass and steel buildings in the city of New York.

What had led up to this moment was a blur.

Everything had flipped upside down; the ground had disappeared under the feet of this demigod ever since that day.

Nothing felt right anymore.

No place felt safe.

His friends tried to encourage him, but there was a reflective wall between them. Their words on grief and love felt hollow to his ears.

They didn't understand.

They couldn't.

The only person who did was six feet under the ground.

There wasn't even a **body**.

The concept of burying someone under the ground was uniquely Midgardian and it still felt strange and uncomfortable and odd to the demigod.

The Asgardian was used to bodies turning into ash and their embers drifting up to the dark night sky; not huddling around a casket watching as your only sibling left of the realm from which you came was settled into the ground.

It felt borderline disrespectful.

But who did he really have to turn to who would understand?

The Avengers had become a second home to the god but they weren't **family**.

And, they never would be.

Not where it mattered—not where it counted.

Tears sprang to his blue and brown eyes as a fist curled itself into the nearest metal object. The substance groaned in protest as a dent was formed in a thunder god's sized fist.

…He really needed to stop breaking things.

"Are you crying?" He could hear his voice so clearly, so brightly that it burst forth unrelenting feelings and truths that had been harboring within the thunder god for months.

He gazed to where he heard the trickster's voice but was only met with the invisible presence of air.

A tear slid silently down his cheek.

"Loki?"

Was this a trick?

Maybe the news wasn't true at all.

Maybe Loki was still here.

But why?

But, did it matter?

If he could see his brother one last time what would he say?

Would words even be enough?

He had the sinking feeling that they wouldn't be.

But, oh, how he would give everything to have that chance again.

For Thor to be called a fool, for Thor to see those mischievous green eyes, for Thor to toss a rock at his brother only for it to go through his illusion. For Thor to be back on the Grandmaster's ship. For Thor to hug his brother, for him to rewind time and put everything he had into just **holding** Loki…Thor would give anything to do that.

He would give anything to see his brother alive again.

But the mere thought brought up the image of his colder, ashen face staring out blankly.

Thor immediately bit his lip so hard that red blood formed at his broken skin.

It wasn't fair.

It wasn't right.

He couldn't tell which of Loki's deaths were the worst. But he didn't want to see his only brother being strangled again and again by a huge, scrotum faced looking purple man.

He didn't want that to be his final memory of his brother.

He had lost so much.

And for what true purpose?

For what reason?

Because out of all his brother's deaths, out of all the days he's spent with baited breath for Loki to reappear again with a "Surprise!" and a quirky smile, all of that nefarious hope made losing his brother all the more worse.

Because it had to do not only with acceptance that Loki was dead but that Loki was never coming back.

Every other time that Loki had passed and Thor had appropriately grieved, Loki had found a way to return.

He felt to mourn him this time would be a dishonor of his brother's abilities to always bounce back.

Because Loki had before. He had found a way back not once or twice, but three times from all over the nine realms and he had been more or less okay and intact.

Thor just wanted his brother back.

But days turned to weeks and weeks into months and still, Loki had not returned.

So maybe this time was the final time.

Maybe this time was the end of the story.

Maybe this time was the period where the semicolon should have been.

Whatever it meant, if it meant anything at all, Thor found himself barely going through the motions.

Sometimes he would find himself before a box of Poptarts with foil wrappers around his feet and the remnants of the breakfast eatery clumped into discernable piles that he had no memory of consuming.

Or sometimes when he left his one-bedroom apartment he would find himself quietly crying at any green and gold clad object he passed by because he saw his brother where everyone else saw the paper boy or a journal.

Thor couldn't shake the idea of his brother away and he doubted if he ever would.

So, like flickers of scenes at the movie theater, Thor found the clear rain droplets puttering on the glass window blur into nonsensical background noise that lulled memories free from their nest within his head.

And, finally, for once in his life, he found himself letting the memories take hold and allowed them to sweep him away.

(*).(*).(*).(*)

It was the battle between his brother soon after Loki had come to uncover the truth about his parentage.

They were by Yggdrasil and Thor pleaded with Loki not to fight him. He loved Loki, he didn't understand why he tried to kill him with the Destroyer on Midgard or why he was so hellbent on murdering the Frost Giants in droves.

Loki had lied to Thor and the state of affairs between their mother and father and his exile and there had been so much vehemence in his snarled words threatening to hurt Jane.

Thor had felt in that moment that his brother had never looked so much like a stranger. He felt betrayed in more ways than one and he didn't understand what was happening or who Loki seemed to be.

He would only come to understand this later, even though it still made little sense to the elder sibling.

Loki was and would always be his brother. Nothing in the world would change that. Nothing.

Thor's love for Loki was unconditional.

It was all it had ever been.

Thor had learned about love and hope and losing everything during his exile.

He never thought, never considered, upon his return that he would lose the light in his world, that he would lose his younger brother Loki to forces unseen.

Forces he never thought would have existed in the eyes of his younger sibling.

It felt like a plunge into cold water. It was unexpected, surprising and so very heartbreaking.

Thor wanted nothing more than to speak reason into his brother, but Loki only wanted death and destruction and absolute power.

The battle by Yggdrasil was not the time for talking. No longer were words required but action.

So, Thor had to fight Loki.

He had to save the others—those who were innocent and undeserving of Loki's wrath.

He didn't have a choice.

But Loki's words still rang through his mind.

" _I wanted to be like you. I wanted everything_. I never wanted the throne! I only ever wanted to be your equal. _So, I tried to be like you, and I got swept away_."

Thor hadn't realized it at the time but these words would come to haunt him. In the hours after Loki's presumed death, Thor would examine his memories and the things that were said for something he could have done differently. Had he just been more validating, had he grabbed Loki's arm, had father been more understanding, would these things have changed Loki's fate?

But as it happened, Thor remembered telling his brother: "This is madness."

And Loki, tears in his reddened eyes, shaking with his reply: "Is it madness? Is it? Is it? Come on, what happened on Earth that turned you so soft? Don't tell me it was that woman…Oh, it was? Well, maybe when we're finished here I'll pay her a visit myself!"

Thor whimpered softly as the raindrops came quickly back into focus.

That fight had been such a dark time in Thor and Loki's relationship. Even with everything that had happened since then, it was a level of betrayal Thor would not wish upon anyone. It was so striking, so bitter, and so out of left field that only upon reflection and time would Thor come to see the signs that Loki was not the doting younger sibling who loved him as much as Thor loved Loki as he had once assumed.

And, even then, Loki did have love for him. He probably would not have admitted it but on the ship with Thanos, he had announced himself an Odinson and that was some progress. Loki had also stopped Thanos from torturing and killing him which made Thor swell with bittersweet pride.

If only Thor could have done the same act for Loki.

If only Thor could have been there for Loki when he so desperately needed it.

But, maybe, Loki wouldn't have let him in.

Regardless, the guilt Thor had for not doing more for his brother, for not being around for him, made his heart ache.

He decided he couldn't watch Loki fall from the Bifrost again in his mind just yet.

It was still too painful of a memory.

So, instead, Thor shifted his attention to a moment from their younger childhood.

(*).(*).(*).(*)

Loki stood at the crossroads of two distinct paths and Thor was trying to get him to choose, with boisterous valor, the path to the left.

"Come, brother, this path you so clearly can see is the right one for our mission!" Thor's voice raised an octave and made him think of a squeaky mouse on the loose.

Loki immediately shot him a look of displeasure and vehemently shushed him.

"Thor," he insisted under his breath. "Not so loud." He began to say something else, when in retrospect Thor cringed, as his own voice grew louder and he almost cruelly interrupted his brother.

"Fear is not becoming of you, brother."

Loki's eyes narrowed considerably.

"Do you wish to get us killed? Because I refuse to die today because of your ill actions."

Thor immediately scoffed. "Loki, we are not going to die."

"Oh? And how would you know? You're the one who failed our lesson on these creatures and know next to nothing about the content of their environment."

Loki huffed and spun on his heel.

"If you wish to get yourself killed then go down that path but I will not knowingly follow you only to be traumatized of your brutal death." Loki cast a glance back at his elder sibling with interest in his eyes. He hesitated but then uttered, "I may not always enjoy your presence but I would hate to tell mother about how her dutiful son killed himself because he refused to listen to his smarter, more well-balanced sibling."

Thor, mouth opened wide, shut his jaw and smirked, "You would describe yourself as such?"

Loki raised a brow in challenge.

"And you would say differently?"

"Oh, but of course not," Thor held up his palms in a placating motion. "You are much too wise for a fool like me to outsmart."

Loki leveled a glare at him.

"Sarcasm is unbecoming of you, Thor."

"It is not sarcasm, brother. Your fear clouds your vision."

"At least I am rightfully cautious rather than being arrogantly foolish."

"Then I guess we must agree to disagree."

Loki huffed, muttering under his breath, "Copout."

The still rising sun slipped behind the foliage, casting long shadows upon the dirt and sending a chill through Thor's light clothing. They had left the castle with only shreds of moonlight to guide them and hadn't changed into their armor, so Loki did have a point in that they were unprepared for a battle.

" _I didn't know that it was so cold and I needed someone to show me the way_."

Loki smirked this time, "It's not cold to me but you're right, you were in dire need of a tour guide."

Thor smiled without mischievousness and moved forwards.

" _So, I'll take your hand and we'll figure out that when the tide comes I'll take you away_."

Loki initially cringed and protested before allowing Thor to take him back to their safe journey home—in one piece, no less.

(*).(*).(*).(*)

The next memory that flitted across Thor's vision was of an argument the two siblings had one late afternoon. Thor was in Loki's room and the younger brother had landed himself into a fight after the Asgardian triumph over a leading nation. Loki was nursing himself a healing enchantment to cover the bruise that glowed purple and red over his left eye.

Thor, nervous with anxiety as Loki had failed to mention just who was responsible for his brother's plight, tried pleading with Loki to have mother or father get involved.

"Brother, I assure you that you will not get in trouble if you just tell me who did this to you."

Loki growled lowly in response, adding: "Leave it be, brother."

"No, Loki, _if you want to I can save you and take you away from here._ "

"And what good would that do for me?" Loki snarled back, miss-stepping with his spell which caused his skin to turn green. He quickly recovered from matching with the foliage outside and shook his head.

"You wouldn't understand, Thor."

He said it so softly that Thor blinked and lowered his own shoulders, which had been raised with tension, and his own voice. Before he could reply, Loki offered him another insight into the younger sibling's pain.

"I'm not as strong as you. I don't have as many friends. I am nothing while you are something. It's not the same for me as it is for you. I…" he trailed off, a solemn expression falling over his features.

"Loki, why does it sound like you're _so lonely inside_?"

Anger, not likely aimed at Thor, erupted on his brother's face.

"Because, **Thor** , _you're so busy out there_. That you forget I exist."

Thor's mouth fell agape.

"Brother, you know that's not true."

"Oh, isn't it? Do enlighten me, Thor. For I have in some manner painted the wrong picture inside my skull."

Loki rolled his eyes, but before Thor could protest his enchantment had finished and his skin had returned to its pale complexion, emotions hiding behind his bright green eyes.

"This conversation is over."

Thor rose quickly from his chair in indignation.

"Brother—" he protested but Loki leveled another glare at him, eyes narrowed and posture unamused.

"No, Thor, this I must do alone."

And with that said, his brother's form got smaller as it traveled down the hallway.

A pool of regret formed by Thor's ankles as looking back now, thousands of years later, he can see how much courage that took for Loki to say and how invalidating his response was to his brother. He shouldn't have closed off the conversation, he should have asked more of Loki after, he should have defied his brother's requests and told mother at least that he was worried for Loki. For not saying anything was a mistake and maybe if Thor had, things would have turned out differently.

But most of all, Thor wishes he would have said:

" _And all you wanted was somebody who cares."_

(*).(*).(*).(*)

" _I'm sinking slowly,"_ Loki warned with a calm complexion on his skin.

Thor was standing at the edge of a pile of quicksand that Loki had, while arguing with him, distractedly walked into.

" _So, hurry hold me,"_ Thor murmured extending his beefy arm out to his brother from the sidelines of safety.

Loki's eyes gazed over Thor in thought before he pursed his lips and said, "No."

Thor sighed in exasperation. "Loki, _my hand is all you have to keep you hanging on."_

"Trueeeee," Loki drawled but settled his hands on his hips and pouted his lips. "But at what cost?"

Thor's brows scrunched in confusion. "What do you mean?"

Loki rolled his eyes. "I mmmmean, what's in it for me?"

Thor's head swiveled from side to side almost as though he was clearing his mind.

"What-?"

"Let me use your armor in the next Asgardian battle and I," Loki waved his hand, "will allow you to rescue me."

"Wait—you want something of mine to make up for me having to help you?"

He nodded simply.

Thor sighed.

"It is an odd request, especially since you won't fit—"

"I can make it work."

"—but, uh, all right, brother."

Thor gave his sibling a quizzical look that he hoped communicated every question and perplexity of the situation that lingered in his mind—although he was almost certain that Loki didn't notice it—as he again extended his arm out to him.

Instead of solid arm meeting solid arm, however, Thor's unexpectedly fell through Loki's as his feet shuffled forwards haphazardly while he felt a rough push from behind so that he collided gracelessly into the sinkhole of sand.

He just managed to see the flicker of Loki's illusion evaporate before his face absorbed the majority of the impact into the sliding surface.

From behind him, he heard a muffled giddiness.

"Mmphki!" He mumbled without opening his mouth as his once flailing arms froze into stillness as he tried to remember their royal lecture on quicksands and how to remove one's self from them.

"I can't believe you fell for that," Loki's muffled voice returned, almost circling around the pile of sand, but it was hard to tell with the granules lodging into the thunder god's eardrums.

"Mmphki, mhet fee mmow!"

"What was that, brother?" Loki asked, cupping a pale hand around his ear and laughing. "I mean, I could save you after all, brother, but at what cost?"

"Mmphki!"

Loki sighed dramatically, coming towards the shape of his brother sinking into the sand with every jerky movement. He leaned onto his knee, nodding as though he and Thor were negotiating.

"Alas, you are right, brother. Mother would not be satisfied upon my return to Asgard alone. I suppose I will help you… What was that?... Oh, yes, you can pick up my punishment of cleaning the stables, why, how considerate of you, brother. Thank you, I'll let you out now."

When Thor landed on two shaky feet and even ground he glared at Loki and the grin that laced his face.

Loki could have his fun, yes, but on the way back to Asgard, if Thor's foot accidentally entered Loki's range of walking, and if his brother just so happened to fall because of it, he kept the smile to himself and inexplicably partook in mischief and mayhem that followed the siblings for years after.

(*).(*).(*).(*)

In contemporary day, Thor's vision had blurred from the tears in his eyes and the faint smile on his lips caused him to cringe internally.

It wasn't enough that Thor had lost his mother, his father, his hellish sister but ultimately his brother, too. The world felt too cruel to function in.

The fate of his brother ignited too much anguish and he felt that maybe looking back at his memories wasn't helping him—but what did any of it matter, anyways?

The nine realms had lost Thor's anchor, Thor's unconditional love for Loki that felt dried up and tossed away—but Thor knew the truth: even in death, he loved his brother.

Loki had always been mischievous and while he had his faults, he was a brave fool whose parentage had been kept hidden from him for centuries that when he found out, escalated into an attempt to rule the Midgardian planet that Thor had found even more love in.

Jane.

The memory of the woman was bittersweet.

He had lost so much and Jane was no exception to that.

Wherever Thor graced his presence he often found love and appreciation but with Loki that was not the case.

Thor couldn't help but feel guilty now because of it.

If things had been different…if it were Thor in Loki's shoes, would anything have changed? Would it make more sense? Would it be easier to digest?

Would he have a reason for why things turned out the way they did?

Or would Thor still be here, on this bed, alone?

…Thor took a moment to mentally curse his Asgardian blood. He hated to think it, but had he been inherently built tougher, tougher than Loki's Frost Giant origins to have been able to withstand the power of Thanos and a dying star?

Ultimately Thor found himself questioning: why Loki and not Thor?

"Survivor's guilt," his voice croaked in the ambiance of the rain.

That's what the mortals called it. It was a phenomenon prevalent on Midgard where a survivor of a traumatic experience wondered why they had not been killed when others had perished around them.

It was a guilt of "I should be dead, too" where a life had been spared for no known reason.

Why did the nine realms act in this way?

Why were their reasons for distorting reality and the lives of millions so god damn unforgivable?

Why couldn't the mortals, hell the demigods, well-being be thought of for once and peace be brought to the realms once and for all?

"Probably because there are characters like me."

Thor spun on his bed in a state of hysterical startle, only to continue to find the grand expanse of empty air.

"Brother?"

The silence that followed in the apartment was all-encompassing. Thor could hear his rapid heartbeat in his ears before he took a glance at the nearest clock that read 5:23p.

Had it really been that long?

Thor shook his head.

Time had been moving unbelievably fast over the course of time between Loki's death and the battle in Wakanda to now.

He stood abruptly—he needed to be leaving.

It was time.

(*).(*).(*).(*)

" _Please, can you tell me?"_ he pleaded, following the curtails of Loki's shirt.

"No, Thor." Loki replied coldly, not even bothering to acknowledge his elder sibling.

" _So, I can finally see_." Thor continued, refusing to give up.

Loki spun around on his heels, aggressively pushing Thor back with a shout.

"Leave me alone, Thor! I don't want to talk to you! I don't want to be **near** you."

"But, Loki, I—"

"No! Listen to me, brother, I want you to speak of nothing more about this. I don't want you to "save me." You can't, okay? You can't save me, so stop fucking trying to."

A chill and a cold sweat broke out on Thor's skin as his brother disappeared before his eyes.

He felt panic immediately as he began to embarrassingly hyperventilate in the middle of the palace's corridor as he was overwhelmed with the helplessness that every Asgardian feared.

He was losing Loki.

…he had **lost** Loki.

The idea that he could lose his very brother to forces unseen wrapped around his body in a foreboding feeling.

Loki, his brother, his loved one that was separate from him, could be lost into a void unthinkable and unimaginable to Thor.

One day Loki would die and only he alone would go through that. Sure, what was left behind would remain to those alive and in this moment that Thor suddenly realized this, he felt he had lost Loki in a whole other way.

He wasn't sure if there was any way he could bring him back.

He was just trying to help Loki but Loki wanted no part in it.

But Thor could still see his brother was hurting. And to think all Thor could do was accept where Loki was at, to sit back and watch his brother wrestle with demons and shadows that no other Asgardian could see, boiled his blood.

Thor wanted to help.

He just wanted to help!

Why was that so difficult to do?

Why was Loki determinedly pulling away from him?

If Thor could help Loki, why couldn't Loki just accept that?

Instead, Thor would be advised by others to let Loki live his life as he saw fit.

Thor was told that he couldn't help Loki until Loki decided to help himself.

But those feelings that were brought up because Loki refused to let Thor in—no one was there for Thor then, when he needed to vent.

They would be there for him before but not after.

No one gave him a set of instructions on what to do next, what to say next, how to help, how to accept that there may not be anything he can even do.

There was none of that.

No one.

So, Thor would leave the conversation as though it were suspended in the air, halted in time.

And as his breathing slowed in the moment and he grounded himself back into reality where he could move his appendages again, he continued beneath his breath, _"Where you go when you're gone."_

And in the end, he would regret leaving Loki like that ever since.

(*).(*).(*).(*)

By a quarter to six he had made it there in time. Thor trailed his fingers over the long blades of grass, their fuzziness tickling him in a way that reminded him of childhood innocence and brought up a longing within him to return to more peaceful times.

He thought of the happier moments with Loki then: the times he would cradle him by the neck, the times they enacted the plan of get help, the laughs, the cheer, the smiles he would later learn masked a haunted soul.

He saw his brother so clearly: green eyes twinkling, long black hair strewn over his shoulders, a thinner frame than he but strong and mighty all the same.

He saw Loki not from above or below but across.

He always had.

And he knew now that he would never stop.

He knew now that he was nearing the end of the sadness and the loss that had gripped him in a tight hug for months. He would never truly move on but he would be able to move forward despite his ongoing grief.

The loss of a loved one never truly vanishes but there comes an acceptance of the ache, of what could have been, of what there is yet to be that allows you to move forwards.

He knew that was what mother would have wanted. She would have wanted her sons not to mourn forever but to do the hardest thing and let her go so they could move forwards without her.

Loki, he reasoned, was no different in that regard.

"I assure you, brother, the sun will shine on us again."

It was a cryptic message Thor had still yet to find the meaning of.

But in the fading light of the sun he swore he could feel comfort now in those words.

Hope blossomed in his chest to reach out to others who were grieving, to make meaning out of his losses.

Maybe there was some understanding, some meaning that could be found in Thor's grief to help him connect to the mortals that inhabited this planet.

He would live longer than they, but not forever.

And one day his fate, his journey in life would end, too.

Until then, he needed to find the courage within his soul to let his loved ones go.

Because in all actuality, with their memory between his ears and the actions he makes as an Avenger turned Revenger, they never truly go away.

They live on despite their vessels having ended.

A human like a demigod, is not just their body but a spirit, a mind and an entity that paired with a body can bring life to one another.

All beings are inherently interconnected—each individual has the power and the capacity to change and influence hundreds more.

It's when this power is used for evil that other heroes like Thor have to step in.

He let out a dry laugh, Vision would have a more eloquent way of putting that. Even his brother would, too. He'd discourage Thor from opening his mouth too wide because he didn't have the brain to pair two words together, let alone in a thoughtful manner.

Death, as it were, is a part of life.

If nothing else Thor had learned that devastating fact from Thanos himself. Where the purple creature could kill millions without a second thought, Thor felt the depth and loss of each one. In the final battle with Thanos the team had experienced traumas and the ultimate sacrifices.

They may have been overzealous and far too trusting, but no life was held above another. They did not sacrifice one life to save millions. They set the standard and the innate fear that no life was more or less important than the next.

Granted, they had still lost, but many had not lost everything. Not lost everything quite like Thor had.

Father's words came to him then as he neared the spot in the long grass:

"Asgard is a people, not a place."

And these people, Thor would never forget. He would instead choose to carry on their memories before his dance with death was to come.

So he had been gathering together books and writings, passages of works that would grace the bookshelves of the Midgardian people.

If he could share one ounce of his lifetime with others, then maybe everything that had happened had had a point after all.

Maybe his words alone were not enough but publishing a collection of other works by other authors appeared to him as a good solution.

In that way, when it was his time to depart there would be something of his people, of Asgard and of himself that would be left behind for anyone else to take up into their hands.

What Thor sought for now was a legacy.

He sought for ways in which others could remember him and his people by. Ways to keep them alive when they are physically gone. He sought for the mortals to find some meaning in his woes and relate to them with their own.

Because Thor knew now that everyone has a battle to face in life and sometimes these battles cannot be defined by a loss or a win, but by having spread hope, light and positivity so strong that it, even temporarily, outshines the darkness.

And Thor knew for certain, in all his hundreds of years, that more beings like Thanos were bound to appear and it was up to everyone left behind to do everything in their power to combat them.

It wouldn't be easy and it wouldn't be without losses.

It wouldn't be without sacrifices.

And yet it would be the most important battle ever to be seen. And ultimately, life would go on.

New beings will create families, families more families and generations will be made that fight similar battles all over again.

Life begins anew as another life's story comes to an end. It was just how things went.

Death wasn't so much a fear for most but the idea of being forgotten.

And Thor had already lined up the way in which he was to deal with his own ultimate end. By compiling his books and ultimately by sharing his love for his realm, his people and his brother, Thor was seeking and finding forgiveness.

His sorrow ebbed away in time with the distant ocean waves hushing in and out, over the shoreline.

The hill he stood on overlooked a secluded beach and it reminded him of the last conversation Thor and Loki had had with father.

Thor's joints ached as he sat down among the grass and patted an open palm over the still damp resting place.

"Here I am, brother." He whispered softly.

"Let's enjoy the sunset together now, shall we, Loki?"

Tears appeared at the corners of his brown and blue eyes as he spoke to Loki about what he'd been up to and how he'd like to say goodbye.

When he finished, his tears of sadness had blended in together with tears of peace and forgiveness.

"You always were a good listener, brother."

He paused.

"I miss you, Loki. I really do. If it could have been me, I—"

Thor ruffled in his jeans for a napkin, which he used to wipe his eyes.

"But that doesn't matter. It wasn't me, it was you. I don't know how to go on without you. I've woken up every day thinking it was just another nightmare but every day it's still true. You're gone. You've left me. But you know what's also always true?"

He placed a slightly wrinkled photograph that showed the two siblings in a rarely captured moment.

Their smiles were wide and the light in his brother's eyes was almost surreal.

He looked at it fondly in silence for a few moments, trying to memorize every inch of his brother's face. He wouldn't be coming back here daily anymore.

It was time for Thor to move forward, to create his legacy in honor of Loki.

With a sad smile he removed his gaze from the picture to the skyline ahead and he said, loudly and clearly:

" _If you need me you know I'll be there."_

* * *

 **A/N:** Heyyyy everybody! This installment has been a long time coming! All the dates this was written and typed will be down below, but if you noticed the Italics had a certain melody to them, that's good because they're all song lyrics from Michelle Branch's "All You Wanted." (Which I don't own nor do I own the Marvel characters used here!) I was initially just going to have them as lyrics normally tend to be either at the start or end of the story but once I started to interweave them into the story as dialogue, I got really into it and kept it the same throughout the story! (I've not seen someone else do this before too, so that's a bonus!)

Originally this fic was meant to be a one-shot, but I recently came across hearing Michelle Branch's "Everywhere" on the radio, much like how this fic came about from hearing her other song and my thinking it would be a perfect song for the backdrop of Thor and Loki's relationship, and I've decided to write a prequel to *this* story with that song (the fic will be called: "It's You I Breathe.") So, if you enjoyed this fic you'll probably enjoy the prequel too, as what I did here will follow suit there, just set sooner after Loki's death then this one was.

I also have a few other fics under progress ("Carpe et Capere") as well as chapters in the middle of writing that I stopped because life and school came underway ("A Little Unsteady", "Severed", "Distorted & Disordered") BUT I have just a month left of school now before I graduate (as I'm typing this, and I'm thinking this will come out at the end of the week) so while that's ongoing I'll probably be able to write some behind the scenes but not get things up until it's finished (week before Christmas). I'm also putting my work up on AO3 if anyone is interested or finds it there. :] (Though I haven't updated that in forever either).

Any who, that's enough from me! A lot of this fic was to process what happened in AIW, and I think I achieved that pretty well and I really just love how this fic came out. I hope that you, too, enjoyed this story and that it satisfied your curiosity and allowed you to be reminded of each of our own mortalities while also leveling off this weird thing we call life with meaning-making and crafting our legacies. Leave me a review to let me know what you think! I'd love to hear from you. :] Until the next one…

PPS: As you may know from reading my other stories, I tend to write exclusively Loki centered fics so actually writing more from Thor's POV as I did here was pretty interesting and fun. :] Also, I kind of love how this story's ending became a bit meta.

Dates:

Idea: 8/16/18,

Wrote out lyrics for easier reference: 8/17

Hand written: 8/19, 8/27, 9/3

Typed: 9/25, 11/13


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